Teaching writers how to write a bestseller

[Paul Whybrow]

From the Evening Standard, an entirely uncritical description of the Faber Academy novel writing course, which reads more like an advertisement than responsible journalism:

Can you teach someone to write a bestseller?

It's worth clicking on the link to the article about algorithms.

What strikes me about such courses, is that the main advantage of them is that it puts the writer in the eye of publishing folk who matter. Just think how hard it is to get even a form letter of rejection from a literary agent or publisher. Also, if you've laid out £4,000 to improve your skills as a writer, it shows how serious and dedicated you are—or, how wildly delusional you are, though they don't accept everybody having a selection process.

There must be a knock-on effect too, as 62 graduates have gone on to secure publishing deals, attending the Faber Academy makes a great calling card.

Shame I don't have four grand to spare....

 

[James Marinero]

How about crowdfunding?

 

[Paul Whybrow]

I like the look of the Unbound crowdfunding organisation:

Unbound | Liberating ideas

 

[James Marinero]

Good share @Paul Whybrow! I think the problem might be that one would give away the premise of the book. On the other hand one is testing the appeal - and the initial pitch has to be convincing. However, the people who contribute to a project fund might not be representative of a genre's market. Or maybe they are?

It's clear that the concept has legs given the prizewinners in the list. In some ways it's analogous to business angels (and theatre angels).

 

[Luciferette]

From the Evening Standard, an entirely uncritical description of the Faber Academy novel writing course, which reads more like an advertisement than responsible journalism:

Can you teach someone to write a bestseller?

It's worth clicking on the link to the article about algorithms.

What strikes me about such courses, is that the main advantage of them is that it puts the writer in the eye of publishing folk who matter. Just think how hard it is to get even a form letter of rejection from a literary agent or publisher. Also, if you've laid out £4,000 to improve your skills as a writer, it shows how serious and dedicated you are—or, how wildly delusional you are, though they don't accept everybody having a selection process.

There must be a knock-on effect too, as 62 graduates have gone on to secure publishing deals, attending the Faber Academy makes a great calling card.

Shame I don't have four grand to spare....

Hi Paul,
I read that, too. I have a vested interest - in May, I started Faber's Work in Progress course as a motivational tool while I'm writing my second novel. It's a year long, taught by Tom Bromley (who's turned out be a great tutor). As I've written on here before, when I was on the Curtis Brown/ITV competition, CB offered me automatic acceptance and a discounted fee on one of their courses - bringing the cost down to a mere £3000!
The only way I could afford anything like this was to either A. Pay it on my credit card and spend the next ten years paying it off, but CB didn't accept credit cards, or B. Pay monthly, which they also didn't offer (not sure if they do now, though). Faber, on the other hand, did offer that option. Then my poor old doggy died in January, freeing up about £100 a month...the exact cost of the Faber course! So I took the plunge.
I'll admit I was sceptical; the puff pieces in the press for both companies struck me (like you) as being thinly-veiled advertising. However, I have to say that it is definitely having the desired effect. I've written 30,000 words, got great critiques from both Tom and my fellow students, read some brilliant books on our course Reading List, and I'm damned if I'm going to shell out all this cash then twiddle my thumbs for twelve months!
I'm a realist. I don't in any way expect this course to open the magical gateway to agents and publishers (I'm still querying the full of my first MS - CB have the rewrite now ), nor to transform my sprawling first draft into something brilliant. It's more a self-discipline thing, and to that end - it's working.

 

[Howard]

Here's my thing: what exactly are they teaching you? Saying they will teach you how to write a bestseller is as dubious a claim as saying they can teach you how to write an Oscar winning screenplay. A bestseller is something with mass-market appeal. It is normally a simple, fairly milquetoast book that can be guaranteed to be picked up in train stations and will sell by the boat load.
That in no way implies it is a good book.
The inner echelons of the publishing industry are just as navel-gazing and ridiculous as the film industry. I for one don't think I have ever seen an Oscar winning film that wasn't an appalling mess of Hollywood fanboyism and smug self service. Producing something that meets their particular requirements for perfection is, personally, not something I would wish to strive for, earning potential aside.

I could be wrong. Maybe this course instills in you a true and deep understanding of writing and allows you to go on on to do great things. Maybe. But right now, I cannot help but notice that I am not queuing up to buy the work of this class' alumni.

<thus ends this sermon on cynicism>

 

[Luciferette]

While agreeing wholeheartedly with what you say, Howard, (I, too, would not want to write to a formula) I think if you look into these courses (as opposed to reading the aforementioned "puff pieces"), nowhere do they claim to teach you to be a bestseller. They do, of course, mention their successful alumni, as any marketing campaign would. But any writer with a fraction of common sense and an awareness of the market will surely be aware that even getting an agent - let alone being a bestseller - is a gruelling combination of bloody hard work, persistence and occasionally a smidgen of luck. Anybody going into this business with an attitude of, 'Easy: hand over my cash, do a bit of writing and BANG I'm on the Booker,' is likely to be sorely disappointed in their course
As you say, it did worry me that Faber might be churning out a lookylikey roll call of writers all working to a particular brief. Thus far, I've found that fear to be unfounded. The ten students in my group are working on very different novels, some genre, some literary, and the guidance provided respects this. As for what the course is teaching me...well, I suppose it's not much I didn't know already. It's more a case of pushing me to look more deeply into my work, and widening my horizons. And - most importantly for me, as it's my main reason for doing it - you get deadlines, structured time management and a very constructive, proactive group of beta readers.
There seems to be a great deal of sniffiness on both sides of the writing camps, these days. I'm guilty of it myself - people like Jessie Burton, CB graduate, and her massive coup with The Miniaturist made me (a cash- and time-poor rural Northerner with zero industry contacts) seethe with jealousy. I'd only admit that on here, btw But when I thought about it, it occurred to me that nobody would get uppity about a nurse doing an MA to further his career, or a lecturer doing a PhD to extend her knowledge - both of which are very expensive. If you can scrape together the cash, and spend it with eyes wide open, I think the well-known writing courses are probably "a good thing".

 

[Howard]

@Luciferette Yeah, I totally agree that, in theory at least, such courses are perfectly valid ways of forwarding what we want to be our careers. No argument. And I also fully agree (and know from first hand experience) that there are definite, concrete things you have to learn before you are ever going to be successful, so again, if these courses teach them, its all good.
My issue is that a good book comes from a good story teller. I think its something you just are, and not something you can train to be. Good, original, striking stories are a thing that cannot be taught, as far as I am concerned. The rest, the ways of putting stories together, the ways of constructing your book, the way of marketing it and of pitching it at your audience, can all be taught, no doubt. I just don't believe it takes a months-long course and thousands of pounds to relay that information.

As I said to our own @AgentPete at the time, his first feedback session on my work took less than 10 minutes and told me more about what I was doing wrong than the sum of all other advice I had received in the last ten years. Therefore, I find it hard to think of the people who run these courses as anything other than cowboys, leading those who frankly have no talent along by the nose with promises of glory.

But again, whatever works for people! I am just vexed by the promise of what could be, I suppose. I have nowhere near the funds to ever attend one of these courses and even if I did, I am skeptical as to what I might learn, or at least, that it could not have been taught to me over a swift half one lunchtime if I talked to the right person.

 

[Luciferette]

Hi Howard,
Couldn't agree more with your take on the matter! I do believe *controversy alert* that you're either born to write or you're not, and that's something no course, however expensive, can give you. Obviously, you can learn the technicalities of plot, pacing, characterisation etc and it's something I've been teaching myself to do (via other authors, how-to books, and plain old arse in seat graft) for many years. You don't need to spend any money to do that.
I'd like to think that the "storyteller" aspect is something that comes naturally to me, and the other members of Litopia (else we wouldn't all be on here!). I really don't like to brag, but the CB agent says I have "such a voice for storytelling" and no less than Marian Keyes said the same thing (I have that from her in writing - I nearly fainted). Again, that's something I've nurtured since the minute I could pick up a pencil and that all of us here have in common.
Got to be careful what I say, because you never know who's reading this, but I did feel a bit inferior when I found out what the other CB winners did: two recent graduates of Creative Writing degrees, one national journalist and one copywriter. And me: self-taught, and definitely naive and a bit "raw". Which is probably why I still haven't quite "got there".
And I'm the world's worst (or should that be best?) procrastinator. Without someone driving me on, it's far too easy to work a 50 hour week then come home and think, 'Ah, feck it, I'm too knackered to write.' That just won't cut it if I seriously want to get anywhere.
I don't go out, don't buy clothes - unless it's from charity shops, don't have any kids, don't eat meat...all of which makes me sound like a right boring cow, but I do spend a bit on wine (let it hereby be known that I am up for a night on the pop with all fellow Litopians )...so I reckoned that with the £100 a month I was paying to keep my doggo alive I might as well try the Faber course and see if it upped my game.
In the end, though, all Litopians write because it's something we're driven to do. I'm buggered if I want to cater to the masses, twist my work into something it's not just to get an agent, or pen a 'Girl'-type domestic noir because I think it's the In thing. And I think we would all agree on that score